EVIDENCE BASED PUBLIC HEALTH POLICY AND PRACTICE

Can scientists and policy makers work together?

Bernard C K Choi¹, Tikki Pang², Vivian Lin³, Pekka Puska⁴, Gregory Sherman⁵, Michael Goddard⁶, Michael J Ackland⁷, Peter Sainsbury⁸, Sylvie Stachenko⁹, Howard Morrison¹⁰, Clarence Clottey¹¹

¹ Centre for Chronic Disease Prevention and Control, Public Health Agency of Canada, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada; Department of Public Health Sciences, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada; Department of Epidemiology and Community Medicine, University of Ottawa, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
² Research Policy and Cooperation (RPC/EIP), World Health Organisation, Geneva, Switzerland
³ School of Public Health, La Trobe University, Melbourne, Australia
⁴ National Public Health Institute (KTL), Helsinki, Finland
⁵ Infostructure Development Division, Centre for Surveillance Coordination, Public Health Agency of Canada, Ottawa, Canada
⁶ Research and Technology Division, Centre for Surveillance Coordination, Public Health Agency of Canada
⁷ Health Surveillance and Evaluation Section, Department of Human Services of Victoria, Melbourne, Australia
⁸ Division of Population Health, Sydney South West Area Health Service, Camperdown, Australia; School of Public Health, University of Sydney, Sydney, Australia
⁹ Public Health Agency of Canada; WHO Collaborating Centre on Non-Communicable Disease Policy, Ottawa, Canada
¹⁰ Centre for Chronic Disease Prevention and Control, Public Health Agency of Canada
¹¹ WHO Collaborating Centre on Non-Communicable Disease Policy, Ottawa, Canada

Correspondence to:
Correspondence to:
Dr B C K Choi
Centre for Chronic Disease Prevention and Control, Public Health Agency of Canada, Government of Canada, AL no 6701A, 120 Colonnade Road, Ottawa, Ontario K1A 1B4, Canada; Bernard_Choi{at}phac-aspc.gc.ca

This paper addresses a fundamental question in evidence based policy making—can scientists and policy makers work together? It first provides a scenario outlining the different mentalities and imperatives of scientists and policy makers, and then discusses various issues and solutions relating to whether and how scientists and policy makers can work together. Scientists and policy makers have different goals, attitudes toward information, languages, perception of time, and career paths. Important issues affecting their working together include lack of mutual trust and respect, different views on the production and use of evidence, different accountabilities, and whether there should be a link between science and policy. The suggested solutions include providing new incentives to encourage scientists and policy makers to work together, using knowledge brokers (translational scientists), making organisational changes, defining research in a broader sense, re-defining the starting point for knowledge transfer, expanding the accountability horizon, and finally, acknowledging the complexity of policy making. It is hoped that further discussion and debate on the partnership idea, the need for incentives, recognising the incompatibility problems, the role of civil society, and other related themes will lead to new opportunities for further advancing evidence based policy and practice.

Keywords: evidence based policy; science; research; policy; decision making

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